Child Tax Credit

As the Superintendent of Denver Public Schools, Michael saw every day how growing up in poverty shapes a child’s future in ways that are deeply unfair. That’s why Michael has been a tireless advocate for expanding the Child Tax Credit, a vital lifeline for families across the country, to make progress toward eliminating childhood poverty in America.

Following his appointment to the Senate, Michael voted in favor of The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 to increase the Child Tax Credit for low-income families.

He built on these improvements and in 2015 introduced the Child Tax Credit Improvement Act, a bill to update and modernize the Child Tax Credit for middle-class and low-income families. This bill would have increased the credit for families with young children, enabled taxpayers to receive the refundable portion of the Child Tax Credit for every dollar earned, and indexed the amount of the credit for inflation, which would have ensured that the credit retained its value over time.

In 2017, Michael introduced the American Family Act to overhaul the existing Child Tax Credit and create a new $300 per-month, per-child credit for children under 6 years of age and a $250 per-month, per-child credit for children 6 to 17 years of age, and for the first time providing low-income families the full credit (also known as “full refundability”) while delivering payments on a monthly basis.

In 2021, Michael worked with the Biden Administration to enact a one-year expansion of the Child Tax Credit – based on his American Family Act – as part of the American Rescue Plan. This expansion cut child poverty nearly in half and hunger for families by a quarter in 2021, benefitted 90 percent of Colorado children, and lifted nearly 3 million children out of poverty nationwide. 

Expanding the Child Tax Credit is Michael’s top priority in the 2025 tax negotiations. Ahead of negotiations, he led 44 of his Democratic Senate colleagues in the reintroduction of the American Family Act which increases the value of the Child Tax Credit from $2,000 to $6,360 for newborns, $4,320 for children age one to six, and $3,600 for children age six to 17.

Despite being one of the wealthiest nations in the world, the United States has the fourth highest child poverty rate in the industrialized world. Michael believes that is unacceptable. Michael continues to work to make the expanded Child Tax Credit permanent, including refusing to enact corporate tax cuts without expanding benefits for working families.

1. Increase the value of the CTC from the current level of $2,000 per child to $6,360 for newborns, $4,320 for children ages one through six, and $3,600 for children age six through 17;
2. End the longstanding, discriminatory policy that reduces the value of the Child Tax Credit for low-income families, ensuring that the families of 17 million low-income children left out of the CTC under current law will receive the same credit as families in the middle class;
3. Provide for monthly delivery of the credit so families have access to the credit as bills arrive; and
4. Index the CTC for inflation to preserve the value of the credit moving forward.

In 2021, Bennet’s expanded Child Tax Credit cut child poverty nearly in half. Specifically, the expanded Child Tax Credit lifted 5.3 million people, including 2.9 million children, out of poverty. It reduced child poverty rates for nearly 10 million kids and shrank racial disparities.

In Colorado, the expanded Child Tax Credit lifted 57,000 kids out of poverty and benefitted more than 1 million kids statewide, including nearly 350,000 kids who had been left out of the full existing credit.

The Child Tax Credit expansion benefited 96 percent of families with kids—including more than 96 percent of families with kids in Colorado. Nationally, 94 percent of kids living in rural areas benefited, along with 93 percent of kids in Colorado’s rural communities.

The expanded Child Tax Credit was also successful at reducing hunger, with the food insufficiency rate for families with children dropping by a quarter after the first payment in July 2021. Families most commonly used the monthly Child Tax Credit payments for food, essential bills, clothing, housing costs, child care, and school expenses.

The following Colorado organizations have endorsed the American Family Act: Early Learning Ventures, Early Childhood Council Leadership Alliance, Colorado Children’s Campaign, Colorado Fiscal Institute, United for a New Economy, The Bell Policy Center, Stand for Children Colorado, Community Partnership for Child Development, Peak Vista Community Health Centers, Catholic Charities of Central Colorado, Mesa County Partnership for Children and Families, and Family & Intercultural Resource Center

The following organizations have endorsed an expanded Child Tax Credit: American Academy of Pediatrics, American Federation of Teachers (AFT), American Friends Service Committee, Americans for Tax Fairness, Association of Maternal, Child Health Programs, Black Women for Wages for Housework, Care Income Now!, Cascade Results, Center for Law and Social Policy (CLASP), Center for LGBTQ Economic Advancement & Research (CLEAR), Center for the Study of Social Policy, Child Labor Coalition, Child Welfare League of America, Children’s Advocacy Institute, Children’s Defense Fund, Children’s HealthWatch, Citizens’ Committee for Children of New York, Coalition on Human Needs, Common Sense Media, Community Change Action, Congregation of Our Lady of Charity of the Good Shepherd, U.S. Provinces, Economic Mobility Pathways (EMPath), Economic Security Project Action, Every Mother is a Working Mother, Family and Home Network, Family Centered Treatment Foundation, Family Focused Treatment Association, First Focus Campaign for Children, Food Research and Action Center (FRAC), Fuerza, Futures Without Violence, Global Women’s Strike, Grace/End Child Poverty California, High Ground Institute, Income Movement, Institute On Taxation And Economic Policy (ITEP), Jewish Family Service of San Diego, John Burton Advocates for Youth, Just Harvest, Just Solutions, Keep Families Afloat, LIFT, Inc., MomsRising, NAACP, National Advocacy Center of the Sisters of the Good Shepherd, National Association of Counties (NACo), National Association of Social Workers (NASW), National Consumers League, National Council of Jewish Women, National Diaper Bank Network, National Employment Law Project, National Immigration Law Center, National Partnership for Women & Families, National Prevention Science Coalition to Improve Lives, National Resource Center on Domestic Violence, National Women’s Law Center, NETWORK Lobby for Catholic Social Justice, Orange County United Way, Oxfam America, Parents as Teachers, Payday Men’s Network, Prevent Child Abuse America, Prosperity Now, Public Advocacy for Kids, RESULTS, San Diego for Every Child, Save the Children, School-Based Health Alliance, SchoolHouse Connection, Southern Poverty Law Center, Texas Kids Can’t Wait, The Arc of the United States, The Forum for Youth Investment, The Invisible Americans Podcast: End Child Poverty, The National Domestic Violence Hotline, TOOTRiS – Child Care On Demand, UnidosUS, Unitarian Universalists for Social Justice, Voices for Progress, Women of Color/Global Women’s Strike, Young Center for Immigrant Children’s Rights, Young Invincibles, Youth Villages, ZERO TO THREE.